I spent some time over the last few days playing both of these games. I'll talk about MLB2K11 first and then WoW in my next post. I have a 360 and not a PS3, so I'm talking about that version of the game. Unfortunately, this also means I can't play The Show, which I've heard by all accounts is a better game.
First of all, I have to say the controls are much improved over last years game. The step hitting timing was so difficult for me that I could only do slap hits and my offense sucked ass. Also, even though I'm bad at pitching, I'm better this year. Last year, if you were only a little bit off on a gesture, you'd throw a "meatball." This year, it's better at figuring what pitch you meant to throw and at least makes some semblance of that pitch.
I only rented the game for five days and I spent the majority of my time playing My Player mode. I made a left-handed 1st baseman in the Cubs organization. I figured if I could build my guy up through a year in the minors, I'd have a shot of making the major league club the next year, depending on what direction they wanted to go. So, I messed up on my "clutch moment" at the beginning of the game and began my grind.
Every at-bat, the game gives you a task to try to complete for points you use to increase your players attributes. These tasks include get on base, get an extra base hit, drive in a run, don't swing at pitches out of the zone, etc. They add to the fun of each at-bat.
I found hitting to be very streaky. I'd go a few games getting a hit or two or three in a row, then I'd go cold for a week. I know hitting a real baseball is incredibly difficult, but the timing just seemed to be off a lot more than it should be. After playing the game a bit, you'd get into a pretty good rhythm, however sometimes you'd just start being very early or very late on all pitches. Also, "power hitting" is incredibly sketchy. They should've called it "pop foul back hitting" instead. You could get a four-seamer right down the middle of the plate, perform a power hit, and the ball would fly straight up and back and get caught a few seconds later by the catcher. I found contact hitting to be much more reliable. I only hit one(!) home run in the minors and that was with a contact swing. As I kept putting points into the necessary categories, I did notice my guy was making better and more solid contact with the ball.
Unfortunately, the hitting was the best part about My Player mode. The defense was kinda terrible. To minimize the amount of time you're actually controlling your guy during a game, you'll only be active on defensive plays where you're going to be making a play. As good as this is for speeding up the game, it means that if you're asked to play defense, you're *going* to be making a play. Playing first base was basically following the exact same steps:
Ball is hit. If line drive, catch ball, play over. If bouncer, if you moved to left, catch and step on bag. If you moved right, catch and toss to pitcher. If play started with runner on first, throw ball to second to start double play. If ball is hit over head into right field, do nothing. If ball is popped up, move to target to catch ball.
There, I think I just covered every scenario. It was so bad, that sometimes the guy would ground the ball foul. If this happened, he would often ground it to the exact same place 2-6 more times until he eventually grounded it fair and you could step on the bag. I only made one error at first base when I accidentally put too much oomph on my toss to the pitcher and winged the ball into the dugout.
Baserunning was the most time consuming part of the game. If you got a single with zero out, you'd often spend as much time on the bases that inning as you would spend playing the rest of the entire game. You press the right trigger to increase your lead and the left trigger to decrease it. You can increase your lead from first four "units." If you increase it to 3 or 4, sometimes the pitcher would throw over to first and you'd have to go back. So far so good. However, to signal a steal, regardless of your lead, you hold down the right trigger until the controller gives a very slight vibrate. 99.9% of the time when you did this, a second later, the pitcher would throw to second and your guy would start running to second. You'd immediately have to hit left trigger to retreat him to first, then the second baseman (or shortstop) would throw the ball to first and you'd easily be safe. I literally did this little dance twenty(!) times in a row. Signal steal, start for second, back to first, Signal steal, start for second, back to first. If you try to wait until the last possible second to signal a steal, for example, when the pitcher comes out of the stretch, it's too late. You can't start the runner until the ball is either caught by the catcher or hit. It's *incredibly* frustrating to be given a task of "complete a hit 'n' run" and you can't even leave first base early.
So, despite all of the problems, I played an entire minor league season with my guy. The only stat-based requirement I fulfilled was "play 15 games" I did not get an average of .260, OBP of .300 or a slugging % of .400. I only had 21 RBIs, 1 HR, a handful of extra-base hits and five steals for an entire season. I did complete all of the skill based requirements save one, and I thought I'd possibly get called up in September. My team, the Smokies won their AA championship but I didn't get called up. The Cubs didn't make the playoffs, but I remember the Angels beat the Brewers in the World Series.
Before I returned the game to the store tonight, I got invited to Spring Training. I only played ten games or so, and I was batting .200 with 4 RBIs. The team was in an odd state at the beginning of 2012. The organization didn't resign Carlos Pena, or any first baseman for that matter. Even my terrible guy was a shoe-in to get the starting job, considering I was the only listed first baseman in the entire organization. The Cubs did sign one guy though: Grady Sizemore was our new center fielder. Other than the unfun defense and baserunning, I also didn't like how the Spring Training games were going. You'd expect the lineups to be different so other players could get to play, but no. It was just the regular season lineup and rotation.
The game has a lot of problems that make me not want to purchase it. I'm really eager to try out The Show now.
